The Blog

Book Suggestion: The Power of Broke

By Andy Hayes

We haven’t had a book recommendation in awhile, but if you’re looking for some summer inspiration while laying back in your hammock dreaming, then I can’t more highly recommend The Power of Broke by the Shark Tank “people’s shark” Daymond John. It’s filled with stories of entrepreneurs of all shapes and sizes who all started with little or nothing and created something amazing. If you are thinking about starting your own business or have just recently started, you’ll find the easy read very comforting.

What is the Power of Broke?

Daymond himself started out as a penniless entrepreneur, but even though he didn’t have many pennies, he had a lot of other things – he borrowed a car, he had his own two feet, he had some knowledge and skills… The power of broke is the idea of being crappy and using everything you have to get to the next step. This shows up in various ways and means in the stories – it’s the grandma with free time and a sowing machine, it’s the friends who have some elbow grease to spare, it’s spotting the small opportunities that are easily overlooked.

We’ve all heard about startups that went from a garage or basement to the Fortune 500, but this book is a reminder that these scrappy stories come all kinds of backgrounds, but more importantly, that the scrappy mindset is something that you can continue to have no matter how big or small your company is.

3 Takeaways from the Power of Broke

There are so many great stories, just reading them provided me a lot of insights specific to my own situation, and I suspect you too will get some ideas for your journey. But I will wrap this book review with 5 of my favorite takeaways.

The most common trait of all the entrepreneurs featured? Grit. Every one of the stories features someone who decided that no matter the circumstances they would do what it took to get through. I call that grit.

You have to work on something that fulfills you. Grit is one thing, but I noticed the people who “made it” did so only when they found a project that really gave them meaning and purpose. Sometimes a little bit of experimentation is needed for that.

The power of broke is not about money, it’s about mindset. Even big, successful companies and people can still cultivate a mindset of looking for opportunities that make efficient use of your current resources.